"Bell... Clang... Bell ......"

On the fifth day of the fifth month of the 29th year of the Apocalypse, with the melodious morning bells ringing in various cities, after two months of fermentation, the cabinet finally announced to the world under the instruction of Zhu Ciran.

The "Cure of Corruption" written by the cabinet minister Kim Hyun was posted in various places and published in the "Daming Pao" at the same time.

The contents of the book exposed the imperfections of the relevant systems of the Metropolitan Procuratorate and the local yamen.

In the song, Kim Hyun believed that corruption and corruption were growing in the Ming court, the capital, the political department, and the local prefectures and counties, and the people were regarded as domestic slaves and livestock, and the phenomenon of using the power of officialdom for personal gain.

This group of people not only caused heavy losses to the economic construction of the Ming Dynasty, but also seriously ruined the image of the emperor and the imperial court.

Therefore, Kim Hyun appeared as a cabinet minister in the "Corruption Campaign", which was approved by the cabinet on the first day of May.

The cabinet demanded that all yamen inside and outside Beijing immediately accept the dual investigation of the Metropolitan Procuratorate and Jinyiwei.

At the same time, Emperor Zhu Youxiao in "Daming Daily" also criticized and encouraged the people to expose corrupt officials and corrupt officials, and the phenomenon of local arbitrary fees.

All the report letters can be secretly placed in all corners of the Royal Store while shopping.

As for the people who make the report, they can not use the real-name system, but leave their names in the form of villages, towns, and counties.

Once the reported corrupt officials are dismissed, all the proceeds from the raid will be rewarded to the people of the villages, towns, and counties whose names have been left behind.

Perhaps in this way, the whistleblower will not be able to get more benefits, but the safety of the whistleblower will be guaranteed.

Maybe it was because it had been suppressed and exploited for too long since the twenty-fourth year of the Apocalypse, or maybe some people took risks for the sake of gold and silver, but in short, with the encouragement of the emperor and the imperial court, the local authorities quickly responded.

From the sixth day of May to the fifteenth day of May, in just ten days, Huangdian collected more than 65,400 letters of accusation.

From a few hundred letters a day at the beginning, to thousands later, the local people became emboldened after realizing that the county government could indeed not find themselves.

Therefore, when the time entered June, the civil inspection and denunciation began to enter the climax.

In "Controlling Corruption", Kim Hyun sets corrupt officials at five levels, and at the same time clarifies the punishment:

In the first case, if the individual embezzles no more than 10 taels of silver, he shall be sentenced to three years of planting trees in Hexi Province.

Second, if an individual embezzles more than 10 taels of silver, but not more than 100 taels of silver, the whole family shall be sentenced to move to the river to plant trees and forests, and shall not leave the local area for 10 years.

Third, officials who embezzle more than 100 taels and less than 1,000 taels under personal behavior will be assigned to Dongshan Mansion by the three clans.

Fourth, those who embezzle more than 1,000 taels under their personal behavior will be sentenced to beheading, and the three clans will be assigned to Dongshan Mansion.

The fifth type, the collective embezzlement case, the organizers and masterminds with a total of more than 10,000 taels, were sentenced to divide the bodies of the masterminds and raze the three clans.

Finally, for officials who cooperated with the Metropolitan Procuratorate and Jinyiwei in the process of investigating the case, and dared to expose other corrupt officials, Kim Xuan also reduced his punishment by one layer as appropriate.

I have to say that the punishment in "Controlling Corruption and Sparseness" is indeed severe, and in the process of local people reporting and officials exposing each other, some radical situations have occurred in various places to varying degrees, such as coerced confessions, induced confessions, and false confessions, thus harming some innocent people.

After Zhu Ciran discovered the signs, he took measures to correct them, and this "anti-corruption case", which was known as the fifth major case of the Apocalypse, ended in May of the 30th year of the Apocalypse.

According to the statistics of the Metropolitan Procuratorate and the Ministry of Officials, no less than 3 million ordinary people and officials have participated in the "anti-corruption" campaign nationwide, and more than 160,000 officials have been found to have embezzled more than 10 taels, about 8.9 percent of the number of civil and military officials in the Ming Dynasty.

Nearly 92 percent of them were only at the "first level", and the Ministry of Criminal Justice sentenced the 140,000 people to go to Hexi for three years in labor camps.

Of the remaining 8 percent, 85 percent are in the "second level", and the Ministry of Punishment has sentenced them and their families to about 80,000 people who have moved to the river to plant trees for 10 years.

The number of officials who have reached the "third level" has reached more than 5,000, and the number of them and the three ethnic groups involved in the entry has reached more than 70,000.

Zhu Ciran strictly followed the "Governance of Corruption" to carry out their sentences, and the three clans were exiled to Dongshan Mansion.

As for the "fourth level", there were only more than 800 corrupt officials, all of whom were sentenced to beheading, and the three clans were assigned to Dongshan Mansion.

In the end, there were only 72 corrupt officials of the "fifth level", and they were sentenced to five horses, and more than 8,000 people of the three ethnic groups went to Huangquan with them.

Several people with higher official positions were executed, including Zhao Yusen, the political envoy of Zhejiang, Zhang Qi, the head of the household department, and Wang Sun Hui, a member of the ministry.

In addition to this, there are also many nobles who have committed crimes.

Seventeen nobles, including Xu Wenjue, Duke of Wei, Zhu Chunchen, Duke of Dingguo, Xu Yunzhen, Marquis of Yangwu, Marquis of Anyuan, Liu Zuochang, Marquis of Funing, Marquis of Linhuai, Li Hongji, Marquis of Lingbi, and Marquis Tang Guozuo of Lingbi, were stripped of their titles, confiscated their family property, and exiled Taixi to the people.

According to the statistics of the Ministry of Households, the number of people punished in this case reached 450,000, and the value of gold and silver banknotes, antique calligraphy and paintings, and acres of houses seized from the seizure reached more than 56 million taels, equivalent to 53% of the annual financial revenue of the Ming Dynasty.

Zhu Ciran collected the antique calligraphy and paintings into the internal treasury, distributed the acres of land to the local people, hung the house to the imperial store and sold it, and deposited the gold and silver in the financial department.

At the same time, he distributed 15 million taels of banknotes, which were distributed to the people involved in the prosecution in the collective form of villages, towns, and counties.

Although I don't know how much of this money can be implemented, but before the big case, Zhu Ciran doesn't believe that the officials dare to embezzle.

At this point, the "anti-corruption case" of the fifth major case of the Apocalypse came to an end.

However, to the astonishment of many officials, as the person who was the most reported, Hong Chengchou, the first assistant of the cabinet, actually had nothing to do, and still sat firmly on the throne of the first assistant afterwards.

On the contrary, the cabinet minister Li Changgeng died in office during this period, and was given a lot of things to his family by the emperor, and he also received the nickname of "Wenzhuang".

After Li Changgeng died, Shen Tingyang, who was the secretary of the household department, entered the cabinet, and he was replaced by Sun Kewang, the head of the household department.

In September of the same year, the cabinet minister Wen Tiren also returned to his hometown, Sun Yuanhua, the secretary of the Ministry of Industry, joined the cabinet, and Li Banghua, the political secretary of Sichuan, took over.

However, it is worth noting that although the main focus of the Ming Dynasty in the past two years has been on "curing corruption cases", it has not slackened its crackdown on the Mughals.

The long-term blow turned the border between the Mughals and the Ming into a blank field, and the Mughals, who once had a population of 50 million, could only continue to attack the internal princely states to consolidate their forces.

At the same time, Mughal peasant uprisings occurred from time to time due to insufficient output, but they were often quickly suppressed by the Mongol cavalry.

By the thirtieth year of the Apocalypse, the minister Shen Tingyang estimated that the Mughal population had dropped by at least 10 million in the past decade.

Not only the Mughals, but also the indigenous population of India's vassals has dropped from more than 34 million to more than 27 million.

By comparison, the number of citizens of the vassals in India increased to 4.7 million.

And that's just the case in India, where the situation in Levia is much better.

With the performance of Chen Zizhuang, the superintendent of Southern Kunlun, the number of citizens of the Levian domains reached 2.3 million.

Due to the lack of arable land, the number of Han people can reach 90% in places with towns, and the rest are either immigrants from India and Yingzhou, or young people who migrated from the Ming Dynasty.

In addition, in the thirtieth year of the Apocalypse, the export of grain from the Qi State to the Tangjihuai Three Domains reached 4 million stones, bearing 20% of the grain gap of the Three Kingdoms.

As for Qi State, since there is no Supervision Department responsible for supervision, the cabinet can only learn about the situation of Qi State from Qi State's annual upliftment.

In the 30th year of the Apocalypse, the total number of citizens of Qi was about 8.6 million, accounting for about 34% of the total number of people, and the total number of people in Qi was 25.3 million.

At the same time, the amount of cultivated land in Qi exceeded 100 million mu in the 30th year of the Apocalypse, reaching more than 100 million 7.8 million mu.

In about seven years, the amount of cultivated land in Qi has tripled, and the annual per capita ration has reached 720 catties, and the annual per capita ration has reached 62 catties.

The Ming Dynasty followed the statistics of Qi and took the Beizhili region as the statistical object, and finally concluded that the per capita ration next year was 819 catties, and the annual per capita ration of meat, eggs and milk was 21 catties.

In terms of staple food, the Ming Dynasty still has an advantage over the Qi State, but in the family letter written by Zhu Youzhen, the king of Qi, to the emperor Zhu Youxiao, Zhu Youzhen clearly said:

"Four hundred catties of staple food is the minimum to ensure a person's life, and people will starve to death if they are less than this."

"But officials can't afford to be complacent just because they've reached that limit."

"If you want the people to live and work in peace and contentment, the annual per capita food cannot be less than 600 catties, Qi and Daming are the only countries in the world that exceed this standard, but we must not slack off, because the people's requirements will continue to increase over time."

"In addition, the annual per capita meat, eggs and milk of the people of the national dynasty is too low, and the national dynasty does not have a semi-primitive wild environment like the Qi country, so it is necessary to plan early."

"The five-year plan of the country and the DPRK has now reached the second one, but it is still far from the annual target of 25 catties of meat, eggs and milk per capita in the second five-year plan."

"The dynasty owns nearly half of the world's grassland pastures, but the dynasty does not make good use of it."

"If we make good use of the high-quality pastures in Nanzhou, Modong and Taixi provinces, even if we cannot complete the goal of meat, eggs and milk in the second five-year plan, we can complete the second and third five-year plans together in the third five-year plan to achieve an annual per capita meat, egg and milk volume of 40 catties."

Looking at the letter in his hand, Zhu Ciran bowed slightly, and in front of him, Zhu Youxiao, who was already forty-six years old, was sitting on the dragon chair of the Qianqing Palace and looking down at him:

"Your uncle is right, we haven't used the pastures in Nanzhou, Modong and Taixi provinces yet, so I'll leave this matter to you."

"Huh?" Hearing Zhu Youxiao's sudden assignment, the twenty-seven-year-old Zhu Ciran was stunned for a moment, and then reacted and said:

"Dad, my son still has to be imprisoned."

"Then you arrange someone to do it, I've been in poor health recently, and Envoy Li asked me to rest more." Zhu Youxiao said this with a weight of nearly 170 pounds, which made Zhu Ciran have to admire his ability to talk nonsense.

"Go down, I'm taking a lunch break." Zhu Youxiao waved his hand, and Zhu Ciran had no choice but to leave the Qianqing Palace.

However, after he left, Zhu Youxiao, who was originally sleepy in his performance, suddenly looked out, and after seeing that Zhu Ciran had really walked away, Zhu Youxiao got up and took off his round-necked robe, and walked towards the side hall wearing his middle coat.

Walking to the door, he rubbed his hands together before lifting his hand to push the door open.

When the door was pushed open, a sophisticated tower appeared in front of Zhu Youxiao.

The tower is one foot high, composed of various parts, and is Zhu Youxiao's proud work this year.

"It's done quickly, and after it's done, you can have people build this tower in Haravan Mountain."

Zhu Youxiao smiled happily, and without waiting for Wang Tiqian to catch up, he turned around and closed the door, picked up the tools and began to "study" alone.

Listening to the sound of axes and chisels coming from the hall, Wang Tiqian shook his head and couldn't help sighing: "I want to spend silver again......

"This year, the situation of the household department is much more relaxed......

When Wang Tiqian sighed, Zhu Ciran met Shen Tingyang, who came to look for him, at the gate of the Qianqing Palace.

Shen Tingyang is now in charge of the household department, so the reason why he came to Zhu Ciran is also for the affairs of the household department.

It is now the fifth day of the winter month, and he has already seen the summary of the household department, and Shen Tingyang came this time to bring the estimated expenditure of Daming next year.

Since nearly 30 million taels of silver were harvested from the fifth major case, the budget for the thirty-first year of the Apocalypse appeared to be very sufficient.

"This year, the household department has more than 143 million taels of bank deposits."

Shen Tingyang and Zhu Ciran walked back to the East Palace on foot, walking on the road and saying:

"On the side of the Governor's Mansion of the Five Armed Forces, the basic expenditure for this year is about 14 million taels, of which the navy needs to spend an additional 2 million taels to purchase cruisers."

"The basic expenditure of the six ministries is more than 47 million taels, the expenditure of the government and academic departments is more than 26 million taels, the expenditure of the Tai Hospital is about 3 million taels, and the expenditure of the Ministry of Industry and railways is 15 million taels."

"Therefore, the expenditure of the imperial court this year is about more than 17 million taels, and the balance after the New Year is more than 36 million taels."

By the thirtieth year of the Apocalypse, the national debt owed by the Ming Dynasty to the people had been redeemed and paid off, so Zhu Ciran would say that the household situation was much more prosperous this year.

However, Zhu Ciran also knew that this silver could not be kept, but should learn from Qi to stimulate the economy.

"The 36 million taels of silver have all been spent, so that the Ministry of Industry can build more railways and realize the full access of the state capital to the railways as soon as possible."

"For the wages of the people, increase as appropriate, and the start date of the railway in the northern provinces is best chosen after the spring ploughing and before the autumn harvest."

Zhu Ciran explained his thoughts, and Shen Tingyang wrote them down.

After Zhu Ciran finished speaking, Shen Tingyang also said:

"News came from thousands of households in Europe, Lin Dan Khan destroyed the western captives in Crimea, the 30,000 troops of the Lu Mi Kingdom (Ottoman) were annihilated, and the Mongols killed and wounded more than 10,000 people."

"In addition, the army of the king of Dark Elia (British) attacked the city of Dover on the fifth day of February this year, and the general of the parliamentary army, Cromwell, broke through to the north, and at the same time attacked London, which was empty of troops."

"When Charles I learned of the attack on London, he ordered 5,000 cavalry from the King's Army to follow Cromwell, who led less than 3,000 Parliamentarian troops to flee to North Wales."

"In response to the people of Euriah, Cromwell fled to the Welsh region, but the main force of the Parliamentarian army to the south was completely annihilated."

"Judging from the situation, although the civil war in Dark Elia has not yet ended, the royal army has gained the upper hand, and the imperial court should stop supporting Dark Elia and let Cromwell in Wales and Charles I in the south face each other."

Shen Tingyang said about the internal affairs of Britain, with the support of the Ming Dynasty and the Qi Kingdom, Charles I, the first British king who should have been guillotined by Parliament, ended the Parliamentary army with an ending contrary to history, and forced the Protector Cromwell to Wales in the north.

A divided England was obviously more beneficial to the Ming Dynasty, so the support for Charles I should end here.

In this regard, Zhu Ciran also bowed his head slightly to express his approval, and Shen Tingyang also followed up and said:

"The situation on the battlefield in Europe is more difficult than that of Euriah, countries are already showing signs of decline, prices are soaring in countries such as Francia [France], and anti-war sentiment is rising."

"In this case, it is estimated that França and other countries will soon sit at the negotiating table with François and Franc."

"If it can be implemented, then Franc will have a crushing victory."

"However, both Hong Ge Lao and Sun Gechen believe that judging from the current situation, if the European countries cease fighting, then they will most likely target us."

"If they abandon their religious views and form an alliance against the dynasty, the dynasty will face an even more difficult opponent than the Nanyu."

Shen Tingyang said cautiously, but Zhu Ciran shook his head firmly:

"Uncle Qi said that it is difficult to end the religious views in Europe, unless this time Franc and other countries can win."

"In addition, if there is a dark Eliah outside of Europe, it will be difficult for a European alliance to be realized."

"As long as the dynasty doesn't put pressure on them, their alliance is just the six countries of the year, and they just look like they are separated."

As he spoke, Zhu Ciran handed the music in his hand to Shen Tingyang and praised him:

"Sun Kewang is doing a good job, and the household department is well managed by him."

"However, there are still a lot of places where the dynasty needs to spend money, and now the Mining Division produces more and more gold and silver mines every year, which will cause inflation if you are not careful, so you need to pay attention."

"In addition, the issue of population and cultivated land also needs to be paid attention to, now that the dynasty reclaims more than 40 million mu every year, are there any corrupt officials in the Department of Agriculture? This needs to be clarified by the Department of Agriculture and the Metropolitan Inspectorate. ”

"I heard from the king of Zibo County that although the local people have not been troubled by miscellaneous taxes for the time being, they have always been bullied in the division of land."

"Those officials who divide the land distribute the good land to those who are close to them, and the bad land to the people."

"This seems to be divided into land, but the gap between the grain produced by one acre of land can reach two buckets to one stone."

"Some officials have zoned farmers' dry land as paddy fields, and their relatives' paddy fields as dry fields."

"In this way, the dry field pays the tax of the paddy field, and the paddy field pays the tax of the dry field."

"In the long run, wouldn't it be a repeat of the collusion between officials and gentry during the Wanli period?"

"It took Uncle Qi decades to put an end to this situation, and Gu would not allow this situation to reappear in the Apocalypse Dynasty."

"The cabinet issued an order to the Department of Agriculture and the Metropolitan Procuratorate to find out how many such people there are in the country, and whether the policy of ten taxes and one tax has been implemented!"

"The lower official receives the order......" Hearing Zhu Ciran say this, Shen Tingyang knew that Zhu Cihong, who had recently studied in Shanxi, had discovered many phenomena.

Zhu Ciran saw Shen Tingyang responding, and walked towards the East Palace by himself, while Shen Tingyang stopped in front of the Wenhua Palace.

Looking at Zhu Ciran's back, Shen Tingyang thought of Zhu Cihong again, and couldn't help sighing:

"This king of Zibo County is about to become the imperial envoy of the capital......"

(End of chapter)